07/05/2016

From: Ronald Adair <ronald.adair@myldsmail.net>
Sent: Tuesday, July 5, 2016 1:00 PM
Subject: The Zoo, the Miracle Dime, Awesome Asians, and a Few Other Things (June 27th- July 4th)

Dear Family and Friends,

This week was crazy and cool!

We went on exchanges with the third ward Elders and I spent it with Elder Brush and Elder Bell. We had a great time! All the Minot missionaries organized a brunch that day together at the church to say goodbye to Elder Bell since it was his last week on the mission. 

On Wednesday we and some of the other Elders did service at the zoo moving a bunch of hay bales. It was hard work! But it was way fun! We got really dirty. Afterward the zoo people let us walk through the zoo for a little while for free! We saw lions, a tiger, leopards, gibbons, zebras, and got to feed a giraffe! Later that day we and some more Elders went to Buffalo Wild Wings with Elder Bell for his last time on the mission. 

On Thursday morning we officially said goodbye to Elder Bell before he drove to Bismarck to fly home. It was a tender experience and we miss him dearly. Luckily he comes to visit the mission with his family at the end of July!

Later on Thursday something crazy happened! So we got our oil changed in our car and we had some spare time to walk around downtown. We walked over the river on a cool, old bridge and went to the Zone Leaders' apartment for a bit and then walked back. As we were walking back to the car place, this guy walked up to us and asked if we had 10 cents so he could buy some cigarettes. We both told him we didn't have any change so he said no worries and started to walk toward a gas station. Elder Beeson then takes one step toward the car place again and all of the sudden...a mystery dime falls from nowhere onto his shoe and then hits the concrete!!! We looked at each other and were like, "Whaaaat??" We knew it was sign from God but I didn't feel like we were supposed to go enable the guy to buy cigarettes, so we walked back to our car and sat inside it wondering what God wanted us to do. We saw that the guy had somehow bought cigarettes anyway so we decide we should walk up to him and tell him we found a dime and maybe it would start a good conversation. So we walked after the guy and found him smoking in an alleyway. We told him we found a dime and he said that he didn't need it anymore because he had bought the cigarettes. We told him we were missionaries and he told us he was Baptist and knows all there is to know about Jesus and church. The conversation ended with us giving him our number and him telling us he wanted to come to our church on Sunday! He lives in the third ward Sisters area so we referred him to them and hopefully they can contact him!!

We began teaching more young adults straight outta China this week too! We now teach 6. We are waiting for some Mandarin scriptures to come in the mail. They all say prayers in English for us and they are getting really good at it! Two of them sang "I Am a Child of God" and it was awesome and adorable! They are so willing to learn! 4 of them were able to attend our 4th of July ward breakfast yesterday at the church and they had a fun time!

We taught the Word of Wisdom to an investigator family of ours and they accepted to live it! They are doing really well and they gave us all of their coffee and tea! They also came to the ward breakfast for a little while.

On Friday I attended my last Zone Training Meeting ever! The time flies so fast!

At church there were a lot of less-actives that came so that was great!

We traded ties with the third ward Sisters the other day... Rather odd!

For the 4th of July we had a great time at the ward breakfast, ate lunch at Sonic with the Zone Leaders, went to a giant barbecue on the air force base, and had a great time at a ward party at a member's house on base. We gained a closer relationship with the members and had a really fun time doing it as well! 

We were allowed to be out until 10:30 last night so we went looking for fireworks so we could go try and talk with people. We thought we had found some fireworks because the fairgrounds were covered with cars...but as we walked up we found out that it was a legit rally car derby! We went and watched it for 10 minutes and then went home to make curfew but it was so cool!

Anyways...it was an exceptionally successful and fun week! Happy 4th of July yesterday! We are so blessed to live in freedom. Gordon B. Hinckley once said, "I am convinced that if we are to continue to have the freedoms which came of the inspiration of the Almighty to our Founding Fathers, we must return to the God who is their true author... May we look to him as the author of our liberty."

Love,

Elder Adair